Bluehost Review

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Have you had enough of all those glowing Bluehost reviews, with all perfect five star ratings? Me too. Imagine reading an honest review about them. Without all the perfect five-star scores, the bias, and the unnecessary and unhelpful fluff.

Like every company, they come with both pros and cons. And, being one of the largest hosting providers in the world, it proves many have faith in them. According to the Consumer Rankings, they are ranked at 9.7 out of 10 by users.

Generous money back guarantee

Even after 30 days, you receive a prorated refund of your plan. If you do decide to leave you also won’t find any pesky penalties or hidden fees.

Good uptime

Bluehost’s uptime track record is really good. I’m monitoring the uptime of 5 random websites. 4 out of 5 websites have had zero outage, i.e. a 100% uptime, over the last month. 1 out of 5 has had a 99.6% uptime (this would equate to an approx 4h outage during the month).

Security is a priority

They offer good protection for your website. They provide secure shell access (SSH) so web devs and admins can access config files securely. SpamExperts, Apache SpamAssassin, and Spam Hammer are their anti-spam tools of choice.

They offer other security features such as an IP address blacklist, password protected directories, email account and user account filters, and access to manage digital certificates and private keys.

Helpful user support portal

They provide 24/7 technical support. In addition to that, they have a knowledge database where users can check out video tutorials, review supportive documentation, and more.

Honestly a lot of people hate on @bluehost. It’s sad they had a bad experience. Ours was great. 2+ years of awesome service on their shared basic plan. We did not even consider changing hosting companies until we topped 100,000 page views in a single month.

Affiliate program

It’s easy and free to sign up; no requirements are necessary to meet. There is no cap on commissions, and they pay you $65 per referral.

A variety of hosting options

If you’re looking to stick with just one hosting company as your business grows, Bluehost has an answer for that. They provide four plans, so you don’t have to switch for server upgrades as your site grows: shared hosting, cloud hosting, WordPress hosting VPS, dedicated, and reseller hosting plans are available.

Quick Start Plan

For those that have no clue where to begin, they have a Quick Start Plan for $79.99. This 45-minute session gives you 1-on-1 training with a company expert.

You’ll learn how to use all the tools in the account such as a cPanel guided tour, web builder recommendation, theme and plugin installation assistance, page creation tips, email account guidance, and other general advice you may have.

Now many hosting providers offer free training, so some could consider paying for the Quick Start Plan as a bad feature. But if you don’t have time to wait around and need all of this training in one sitting, it could be a plus for you.

Generous extras

As a part of their hosting plan, you get a free domain name for the first year. Also, for those looking to boost their business marketing, they offer advertising credits on Google’s AdWords, Bing, and other leading sites.

WordPress Pro

WordPress Pro is Bluehost’s newly launched managed WordPress hosting platform that is optimized for WordPress websites to load fast and to be secure. WordPress Pro comes with all-in-one marketing center and dashboard, where SEO, email marketing, and social media tools all come included.

WordPress Pro is more expensive then Bluehost’s other plans and prices start at $19.95 per month. Speed and security are the main features but it also comes with geeky features such as automatic WordPress core and plugin updates, and regular backups and a staging environment.

Go and check out the WordPress Pro page to see what is included. It’s worth noting that you get live support with Grow and Scale, and these plans also give you hands-on assistance with design, functionality, or general questions from real WordPress experts 24/7.

Bluehost cons

They got loads of positives, but they do have their drawbacks as well.

Confusing pricing

As cheap as $2.95 may sound, users often do not read the fine print to notice this is an introductory price based on a term of 36 months. You do have options to select 12 or 24-month plans, but those monthly prices are more.

For example, you can select the most popular Plus plan at $4.45 for 36 months. However, for 24 months or 12 months, the price increases to $5.45 and $6.45 respectively. There are no three and six-month deals to choose from.

No free automatic backups

While they do offer backups, the backups are considered a courtesy. This means you can’t depend on your data to be backed up daily – so no guarantees here. You must set up and run your own backup via the cPanel and to your own local device.

Another bad feature here is that any data they back up within the past 30 days is overwritten. Their Terms clearly state that they will hold no responsibility for this.

In other words, you can only access the most recent backup they have, even if it’s not the one you need to restore your site.

Site Backup Pro is a paid add-on. It creates regular and automated backups of your site. But, it’s a premium feature you have to invest in.

‘Unlimited’ really means ‘limited’

The Plus, Prime, and Business Pro plans boast of their unlimited number of websites, and “unmetered” storage, email accounts, email storage, and subdomains given to clients.

However, their User Agreement, Clause 7 Usage Policies and Definitions, explain otherwise. It’s only unlimited up to a certain level.

Their unlimited plan is comparable to most providers (i.e. Bluehost isn’t the only web host that promises “unlimited” web hosting).

Draconian CPU throttling / protection

They rolled this out in 2009 and had a few customers bewildered. You may not have heard of CPU throttling beforehand either. You can find your CPU throttling when you log into the cPanel.

Simply put, if they think your website is taking up too many resources, they might decide to preserve the server resources by freezing your CPU usage.

However this isn’t unique to just this web host. In fact all shared web hosts restrict over-usage of resources.

No Windows hosting

They only offer Linux-based servers. In other words, you can’t get Windows hosting. This isn’t a huge concern as Linux is the most used and popular operating system for web servers.

But for those that prefer Windows hosting, this is a problem.

No uptime guarantee

They do not offer an uptime guarantee. When selecting a hosting provider, you want an uptime of as close to 100% as possible. They do not give you a guarantee, but their Network/Server Uptime Agreement states that “most issues are resolved in approximately 15 minutes”.

They average about a 99.94% uptime. This .05% outage means that over a full year your site is down for 4.4 hours. Overall, their uptime is reliable, but again, there is no guarantee that your site will be up and running most of the time.

Load times can be slow

Their load times are not always the fastest either. According to a Kissmetrics study, 47% of consumers believe a site should load in less than 2 seconds. And 40% of consumers will leave the site if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load.

If you web host cannot provide you fast loading times, and you aren’t optimizing your website for speed and performance, you risk losing out on a lot of site traffic.

Up-selling is a business model

Their up-selling practices are designed to make you purchase them. In other words, there will be annoying popups and alerts appearing trying to convince you to buy more.

For example, they have up-sells to select before you check out and finish signing up with them. Also, there are install add-ons you’ll have to purchase that are normally are included with other hosting providers as built-in features.

Slow support response times

Although they do have 24/7 technical support, they aren’t always easily accessible. The response times can vary from ten minutes up to an hour. The initial response is auto generated in some instances.

The good news is that they have made significant investments in their support channel with an emphasis on customer experience and success. The support team’s voice support channel has grown customer satisfaction scores to a historic high at 4.86 (out of 5) for 2018.

Expensive renewal rates

Like other hosting companies, their introductory pricing is to lure customers in. It’s also quite misleading. So, when it’s time for renewal, you’ll be shocked to discover the pricing increases nearly 90%!

If you decide to sign up you are better off signing up for a 24/36 month period on the discounted introductory pricing.

Free site migration is not included

If you’re looking to switch hosts keep in mind they do offer site migrations, however for a fee.

They will transfer up to 5 sites and 20 email accounts for the price of $149.99. Comparing this to other web hosting providers, this is a rip-off as most do not charge anything at all for migrating your site.

Bluehost’s hosting packages

Now I’ll explain a bit of what you can expect in each of their shared hosting plans. There are four plans: Basic (or their starter plan), Plus, Prime, and Business Pro.

Many reviews do not even mention Bluehost as having four plans; typically they cover just three.

(If you decide to give them a go) I recommend that you start with the basic plan, as it’s the cheapest and easiest to start with. You can always upgrade later if you want more power and features.

If you only intend to run a small business website or personal website, then you really shouldn’t need the more expensive package.

Plus plan

Keep in mind their unlimited terms, though. You also get $24/year in extra’s and Spam Experts on one domain.

There are marketing offers of up to $200. Their renewal rate is $10.99/month after that.

Business pro plan

The Business Pro plan costs $13.95 and gives you everything the Prime Plan offers, however, with this plan you also have an included dedicated IP, up to 300,000 inodes, and Spam Experts for two domains.

There is also an SSL certificate, complimentary subscription to their Site Backup Pro service, and other service perks. Their renewal pricing is $23.99/month.

Out of these four plans, most people find that the Basic Plan suits them best. Most people don’t intend to host multiple websites, so your needs should be met with this plan.

If you do find yourself growing (or if you intend to host multiple websites), then the Prime or Pro Plan would be your best bet.

Bluehost’s Hosting Plan Comparison

Which plan should I get? That is what this section aims to help you find out …

So what are the differences between the Basic, Plus, Prime and Pro hosting packages? Here is a comparison of Basic vs. Plus plan, Plus vs. Prime plan, and Prime vs. Pro plan.

Bluehost Basic vs. Plus Review

Their Basic plan is their cheapest plan so it comes with the least resources and features The main difference between the Basic and Plus plan is that with the Basic plan you are only allowed to host one website, but with the Plus plan you can host unlimited websites. If you intend to run multiple websites then you should choose the Plus plan.

Another main difference between these two plans is the amount of web space you are allowed to store on the server. The Basic plan only comes with 50GB of disk space, whereas the Plus plan comes with unlimited space. 50GB is quite a lot of space and should be enough in most cases but if you store lots of images and videos then it can quickly add up.

Finally the number of email accounts and amount of email storage on the Basic plan is quite limited. Perhaps not so much the number of emails as most users never use more than 5 email addresses, but having only 100MB of email storage space is quite low and you can quickly run out of space.

You should consider choosing the Plus plan if:

You want to host unlimited websites on your hosting account

You want unlimited disk space instead of the 50GB that comes with the Basic plan

You need unlimited email accounts with unlimited email storage space

You want SpamExperts which is their spam protection tool

Bluehost Plus vs. Prime Review

There are very few differences between the Plus and Prime hosting packages. In fact there are only things that set these plans apart. That is with the Prime plan you get free domain privacy (also known as whois privacy) for your domain name, and the Prime plan also comes SiteBackup Pro which is their website backup and restore service.

If you are tossing up between these two plans then you are way better off choosing the Prime plan.

You should consider choosing the Prime plan if:

You want free domain name privacy, whois privacy

You want SiteBackup Pro which is their website backup and restore service

Bluehost Prime vs. Pro Review

There are a couple of differences between the Prime and Pro hosting plan that are worth knowing about. The first one, and an important one if you intend to run an ecommerce or more resource intense WordPress site, is that sites on the Pro plan will be hosted on high performance servers.

High performance servers on the Pro plan has 80% less accounts per server which allows the use of more resources per account (more CPU usage, disk usage, bandwidth). It offers more speed, more power, with less users.

The Pro plan also gives you a dedicated IP address and a private (non-shared) SSL certificate.

You should consider choosing the Pro plan if:

You want high performance servers (i.e. a fast loading website) and fewer users that share the server resources

You want a free dedicated IP address and a private (non-shared) SSL certificate

Which hosting plan is best for you?

Their new Bluerock platform is a WordPress focused control panel offering an integrated experience with WordPress websites. Bluerock delivers WordPress pages 2-3 times faster than the prior technical stack. Every site hosted on Bluehost.com will benefit from the latest security and performance features such as:

Free Let’s Encrypt SSL certificate

PHP7, HTTP/2 and NGINX+ caching

WordPress staging environments

SSD drives

Free Cloudflare CDN

Free domain name for the first year

Now you know what plans they have to offer and you are in a better position to pick the best shared hosting plan for your needs. Remember you can always upgrade to a higher plan if you require more resources and features.

Based on my experience, here is my recommendation for you:

I recommend that you sign up with the Basic plan if you intend to run a basic single website.

I recommend that you sign up with the Plus plan if you intend to run a more than just one site or a WordPress site.

I recommend that you sign up with the Prime plan if you intend to run a WordPress or other CMS site, and want security and spam prevention features.

I recommend that you sign up with the Pro plan if you intend to run a ecommerce site or a WordPress site, and want a dedicated IP address plus security and spam prevention features.

What is Bluehost?

Bluehost is a web hosting company that offers a range of hosting services; from shared hosting, cloud hosting, WordPress hosting, WooCommerce hosting, VPS hosting and dedicated servers, to domain name registration and small business marketing services.

What is Bluehost login to …?

When was Bluehost founded and where is their HQ?

Bluehost was founded in 2003 by Matt Heaton. He noticed that web hosting services offered at the time were inadequate, so he set out to fix that by building his own web hosting service. The company’s headquarters can be found in Provo, Utah, USA. Their official website is www.bluehost.com. Read more on their Wikipedia page.

Are Bluehost and HostGator the same company?

No, Bluehost and Hostgator are separate brands and companies; but they are both subsidiaries of Endurance International Group (EIG). EIG also owns hosting companies like iPage, FatCow, HostMonster, JustHost, Arvixe, A Small Orange, Site5, eHost and a bunch of more smaller web hosts.

Can I host multiple domains on Bluehost?

It depends on whether you have a basic, plus, prime or business pro account. You can add-on multiple domains and host multiple websites on the plus, prime and business pro plans. You are only allowed to host one addon domain/website on the basic plan. It is also helpful to understand the different type of domains.

Primary domain: This is the domain name that is considered to be your account’s main domain. It is the domain you use to log into your account and the domain you use when dealing with representatives. There can only be one primary domain per account.

Parked Domain: Parked domains are domains that redirect to the content and the website that your main domain does. So, if your main domain is bakingstore.com, you may also want to have similar names like bakingstore.net, bakingstore.org, etc., as parked domains, because they are so similar. You get 5 of these with a basic package, and unlimited with plus, prime or business pro packages.

Subdomain: These are domains that are created when you add a prefix to your main domain. So, if your website has a forum section, and you make it so that people can get to the forums by typing mywebsite.forum.com, then that is known as a “sub-domain.” You get 25 of these under a basic package, and unlimited under plus, prime and business pro packages.

Add-on domain: These are domains that link to a completely separate website from your main domain. Separate websites with their own domain names are considered add-on domains. You get unlimited amounts of these regardless of package.

What support do they offer?

Yes, they offer 24/7 call support, email support, and live chat. So you can get expert help, no matter when you need it.

What languages does Bluehost support speak?

Technical support is provided in English and English only.

How do I know if Bluehost is down?

If you want to check on the status of websites hosted on them, you can go to bluehost.com/hosting/serverstatus and type in your domain name or account name, they will then send you an update on whether the sites are working properly or not. You can also use this free tool to check if your website (or any website for that matter) is down or not.

Does Bluehost have a website builder?

No they do not have an in-house website builder. Instead, it encourages its users to use either Weebly or WordPress, which can be installed very easily. Both Weebly and WordPress are great website builders and are especially helpful for beginners.

Does Bluehost offer SSL certificates?

Yes, buying or renewing SSL certificates is very easy; just follow these simple steps:

Log into your account and go to your control panel

Click the add-ons header, then search for “SSL” in the search box

Click “add to cart” on the SSL certificate that best fits your website’s needs

You will be sent a verification email to the email address chosen in the drop-down menu, simply follow the instructions in the email and your SSL certificate will be activated

Does Bluehost come with a content delivery network (CDN)?

If you have a lot of traffic on your website, it may become slow and crash a lot. This will turn away a lot potential visitors and hurt your chances of success. One way around this is to use a content delivery network, which makes it so that the content of your website is hosted on different servers in different geographic areas. Users will download the content from the nearest geographic server. Bluehost comes with Cloudflare built directly into it. Cloudflare is a top of the line content delivery network. You can enable it on any of your sites, absolutely free.

What is “Business On Tapp”?

Business on Tapp is a mobile app launched by their parent company, Endurance International Group. The free app gives small to medium sized businesses the ability to directly interact with potential customers and like-minded entrepreneurs. Some of the features on the app include:

Business card swapping: Create your own custom business card and use it to interact with local businesses.

Expert Q&A: Ask a question and have it answered by the community of experts who also use the app.

Polls and market research: Conduct quick sample polls using Business on Tapp users. Get info about the latest trends in business fields.

Experience informative editorial content: Read the unique and interesting pieces written by the experts of the Business on Tapp community that are not available anywhere else.

What is Bluehost “Search Engine Jumpstart”?

SEO (search engine optimization) is an important part of running a website, since it is necessary to drive traffic to your website. The Search Engine Jumpstart Package is an SEO package add-on that users can get for an extra $1.99 a month. It will allow their websites to show up on Google, Bing, and Yahoo much quicker than usual.

Do they offer WHOIS domain privacy?

The whois information for any domain name is available to anyone on the internet. When you add domain privacy to your registration, ($11.88 per domain per year) the contact information listed in the whois database will be Blue Host. You will still be the owner of the domain name, but your contact details will not be accessible through the public whois information.

What is Bluehost “SiteLock”?

This is an add-on users can get for $1.99 a month, it provides standard website protection, such as:

Protection from DDoS attacks

Malware scanning

Malware removal

Protection against spam

Bluehost “Postini”, what’s this?

For the cost of $1 a month, users can get Postini email protection. Postini is powered by Google and is best described as an industrial strength spam filter. It will filter all your emails through advanced anti-spam filters, so that your inbox is never filled with junk emails.

What is Bluehost “Site Backup Pro”?

Site Backup Pro is an optional add-on. It creates regular backups of your site, so that if something goes wrong, you can restore your site to an earlier version with the click of a button. The service also allows you to download a compressed version of your website’s resources; for easy restoration.

Can Bluehost handle high traffic?

They are capable of handling high traffic, however their shared hosting plans aren’t suitable for high traffic websites. You are better off going with their VPS or dedicated server plans. Every user has access to Cloudflare, a content delivery network that helps sites with high traffic keep their servers functioning and keep their website running fast. Activating Cloudflare is easy:

Login and go to your control panel

Go to the domains section and find the Cloudflare icon

Click activate

How to add Bluehost email to iPhone and Android?

Setting up email on your iOS or Android is easy.

iOS

Go to “mail, contacts, and calendar” which you will see when you click the “settings” button.

Click the “add mail account” button.

Click “other” and then “add mail account.”

Add the relevant information and click “next.”

Android

Open the Gmail app and then go to the settings section.

Click the “add mail account” button.

Enter your email address, and then specify what type of email address you want to use (either POP3 or IMAP).

Enter the password for your email address and then hit “next.”

What is Bluehost uptime guarantee?

Under ideal conditions, they promise to solve most issues within 15 minutes; so uptime hovers around 99%. However, given the issues that can arise, those numbers can change. They do not penalize users for leaving their hosting agreement early due to uptime not being acceptable.

What is Bluehost CPU throttling / performance protection?

They keep a very close eye on server resources like CPU and memory. Because of this, they are able to ensure that every user using the server gets an equal share of the server’s resources. Resource intensive websites, poorly optimized websites, and DDoS attacks can still cause issues with the servers. Be warned, if they think a user is causing issues with a server, then that user may be suspended.

What is Bluehost money back guarantee?

Their money-back guarantee only applies to the first term of a hosting agreement. The guarantee is as follows.

Users who cancel within 30 days will receive a full refund.

Users who cancel after the thirty day period receive a partial refund.

The money back guarantee only applies to hosting plans, money spent on domains or add-ons is nonrefundable.

There are no fees if you decide to cancel your hosting agreement early.

What payment options do they offer?

In terms of payment they accept all major credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover), PayPal payments, purchase orders, checks (only US residents can pay this way), and money orders (only in US dollars).

Credit Cards: Credit card payment is the default payment option when you create your account. You simply have to fill in your standard card information (expiration date, cardholder’s name, etc.) and it will be saved for future payments.

PayPal: PayPal is one of the accepted payment options. But, only instant payments are accepted. This means you have to have a bank account or credit card linked to your PayPal account for it to be an accepted form of payment. Once you set PayPal as your main payment method, all auto-renewals will be taken from your PayPal account.

Money orders or Checks: Money orders and checks are accepted, but only in US money. The hosting term must also be for 12 months or longer. An invoice will need to be created before you send a check or money order, this is to ensure that the amount paid is correct. Services that require monthly renewal cannot be paid by check or money order; they require an active credit card or PayPal account. Checks and money orders can be sent to the following address:

They also accept purchase orders, which can be paid by check or money order. But, once you pay with a purchase order, you must always pay using purchase orders or create a new account.

How can I cancel my Bluehost plan?

You can cancel your account at any time for a partial refund. Before refunding, make sure you know:

The last 4 digits of your password

The email address listed on your profile is still in use.

Once you have your password and have confirmed that the email listed on your profile is still in use, call the renewals department at: 844-853-6296. The department will send you an email with a link that will take you to your control panel, where you will be asked to confirm the following:

That you have backed up all important data, including important files, emails, and databases

That you understand that cancelling your account will delete all websites and files for every domain linked to your account

Your renewal settings for domain names and domain add-ons

Your personal information.

The reason for leaving.

After that is done, hit “confirm” and you will be informed if the cancellation attempt was successful or not. Any refunds will be issued by credit card or PayPal.

Transferring your domain name from Blue Host follows a very similar approach. Here’s a video showing you how to transfer out.

What are Bluehost nameservers?

Nameservers are specialized servers that handle requests from computers about the exact location of a domain name’s services. In laymen’s terms, think of it like a phone book. Before calling someone, you would take them time to look up their number in a phone book if you weren’t sure. That’s the logic used with nameservers.

What is my Bluehost cPanel login?

You’ll find the cPanel login details in the “welcome email” you got when you first signed up. When you have set up the nameservers (i.e. pointed your domain name to their servers) you can login to your control panel by typing this URL into your web browser: http://example.com/cpanel/. If you prefer secure log ins, then the login URL is: https://example.com/securecontrolpanel. (FYI replace “example.com” with your actual domain name).

Do they provide SSH/Shell access?

Yes, but SSH/Shell access is not enabled by default. You must verify (see below) your hosting account to have SSH access enabled in your cPanel.

How do I verify my account?

If you live in the US or Canada you can call the verification department on 844-460-5819 (between 6AM-9PM – MST). If you live outside the US or Canada, or if you prefer email you can send an email to verification@bluehost.com (see here for what information you need to provide in the email).

Do they let me edit configuration files?

Yes, you have access to configuration files. For example, you can can override and edit the default .htaccess file, add a custom php.ini file, you can access log files and customize error pages.

Is Bluehost good for ecommerce websites?

They offer Woocommerce hosting. WooCommerce is a plugin for WordPress that turns your site into a fully-fledged ecommerce site. Here are just a few of the features offered by the Woocommerce plugin:

Sell products and accept payments.

Manage orders and shipping.

Integrate with social media and allow customer reviews.

Extend the look and feel of your online shop using free and premium extensions.

Are there any other sites where I can find Bluehost reviews, like Reddit?

Buying web hosting is an important decision and you should do your research. There are a bunch of other websites where you can find genuine and unbiased reviews. For example you can find reviews on Reddit, and on Quora. There are also customer reviews on sites like Yelp and TrustPilot.

What is the Mojo Marketplace?

Mojo Marketplace is an online marketplace where you can install free apps that deal with building websites. For instance, you can download major website builders like WordPress and Drupal. You can also download website themes, eCommerce plugins, and more. Most of the apps offered on Mojo Marketplace are free elsewhere, but what makes Mojo Marketplace so special is the fact that users can download and install the apps with the click of a button.

Does Bluehost have an affiliate program?

Yes, they have an affiliate program. You can sign up by going to their website, scrolling to the bottom, and clicking on the link which will bring you to the affiliate program’s page. Simply click on the “get started” button, then begin filling out your info, and you will be an affiliate in no time.

Where can I find Bluehost coupon codes?

You can’t. They rarely offer promo codes because their pricing is always kept low. They do a great job of balancing price and features and you should visit their official website for current deals and discount pricing.

What’s the best Bluehost alternative?

This is undoubtedly one of the best known and most popular web hosting companies in the world. However if you are researching providers and are looking for good Bluehost alternatives then here are my recommendations. Cheaper alternatives to Bluehost are Hostinger’s cheap plans and HostGator (however it’s also owned by EIG). The best non-EIG owned alternative is SiteGround (read my SiteGround review here)

What is Bluehost Bluerock?

Bluerock is their new and improved WordPress focused control panel (cPanel) that allows for WordPress to be installed upon sign up. On Bluerock your site’s performance is monitored in real time and Bluerock delivers WordPress pages 2-3 times faster than their old technical stack.

Bluehost is cheap (really cheap), have a solid uptime track-record and is very easy to get started with (especially for beginners and for WordPress sites).

On the flip side, there are three major reasons why I personally would think twice before signing up.

Firstly, if you have a website that will get high traffic (such as a commercial or ecommerce site), I suggest you go with an alternative that can accommodate a lot of site traffic.

Secondly, if you need to get ahold of someone in support, waiting for up to 10 minutes or longer in crucial situations is not worth the cheap pricing. But then again, their hosting is cheap so you do get what you pay for.

Thirdly, it’s a let down that website migrations and automatic backups only come as paid upgrades / addons. I know these are straightforward things you can do yourself but I think this should be included for free. Again, you get what you pay for.

If you’re still sitting on the fence, know that their generous 30-day money back guarantee lets you “try before you buy” and extras such as a free domain name and features such as a free SSL certificate and Cloudflare CDN are all solid features well worth signing up for.

By clicking this link, you can get about 65% off of the recommended retail price and host your website for only $2.95 a month.

Bluehost Review 2019 – Summary

Price

Features

Speed

Security

Support

4

Rating

Summary

Do I recommend Bluehost? Well yes and no because it depends what you’re after. It’s a good web hosting option for personal and small business websites and blogs (i.e. for creating your own first website) because it is cheap (very cheap), reliable, secure and comes with a free domain name. However for high traffic websites it (or any other shared host for that matter) isn’t a very good choice. Other major letdowns are that automatic backups and site migrations only come as paid upgrades.

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About Matt Ahlgren

Hi 👋 I'm Matt. I'm an online marketer and web developer who write reviews and tutorials on web hosting, wordpress, online marketing and web development because I wanna help people run their own websites better. You can contact me directly at hello[at]websitehostingrating[dot]com

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Comments

Hi Lisa, just wanted to say that I love your site’s content and design. It’s nice to read a somewhat negative review. I know you’re using WordPress (I know that much 🙂 but what theme is it that you’re using?

I am much happier with Siteground after I moved my site over to them. It was good but when the site started to get some serious traffic I ran into more and more troubles with BH. This is a great site though, love the info and that you are honest about things (very refreshing compared to all the other “review” sites out there) / xoxo Linda

What a gold nugget of useful information your ‘mini’ site is Lisa. You have certainly condensed everything there is to know about Blue Host into one singular place. Your FAQ is useful beyond words! Well done and keep up the great work!

Thx for helping me out in my quest to find a new web host for my photography blog. I’ll sign up with Bluehost and give them a go. Their 30 days money back guarantee should mean it’s risk free and if I change my mind I get my money back, right?

Thanks Jimmy, how are you finding them, happy or unhappy with Bluehost so far? That’s right, if you’re unsatisfied with BH you can get a full refund within the first thirty days, as per their money return promise.

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SUMMARY (TL;DR)

I have rated Bluehost 4 out of 5. Because this is an all-round and good web host for beginners and WordPress users. Your site hosted on Bluehost will benefit from all the latest security and performance features.